The Witch In The Graveyard

Scene: A forsaken graveyard, by moonlight. Enter two witches. First Witch Sit, sister, now that haggish Hecate Appropriate and ghastly favor sheds, And with will light forwards our enterprise; And watch the weighted eyelids of each grave, As never mother watched her babe, to mark, At zenith of the necromantic moon, The stir of that disquiet, when the dead, From suckling nightmares of the charnel dark Or long insomnia on a mouldy couch, Impelled like wan somnambulists, arise— Constrained to emerge and walk, or seated each On his own tombstone, shrouded council hold, Or commerce with the sooty wings of hell. All omens of this influential hour When all dark powers, thronging to the dark, Promote enchantment with their wavèd wings, And brim the wind with potency malign— A dew of dread to aid our cauldron-these Observe thou closely, while I seek afield All requisite swart herbs of venefice And evil roots unto our usance ripe. (The first witch departs, leaving the other among the tombs, and returns after a time, in the course of her search.) First Witch Sister, what seest or what hearest thou ? Second Witch I see The moonlight, and the slowly moving gleam That westers hour by hour on tomb and stone; And shrivelled lilies, tossed i' the winter's breath With their attenuate shadows, as might dance Phantom with flaffing phantom; at my side, The white and shuddering grasses of the grave, With nettles, and the parching fumitory, Whose leaves, root-trellised on the bones of death, Will rasp and bristle to the lightest wind. (The first witch moves on, and approaches again, after an interval.) First Witch Sister, what seest or what hearest thou ? Second Witch I see The mound-stretched gossamers, cradles to the dew; Moon-wefted briers, and the cypress-trees With shadow swathed, or cerements of the moon; And corpse-lights borne from aisle to secret aisle Within the footless forest. . . . Now I hear The lich-owl, shrieking lethal prophecy; And whimpering winds, the children of the air, Lost in the glades of mystery and gloom. (The first witch disappears, and passes again shortly.) First Witch Sister, what seest or what hearest thou ? Second Witch I see The ghost-white owl, with huge, sulphureous eyes, That veers in prone, unwhispered flight, and hear The small shriek of the moon-adventuring mole, Griped in mid-graveyard. . . . And I see Where some wild shadow shakes, though the pale wind Of midnight stirs far off . . . and hear Curst mandragores that gibber to the moon, Though no man treads anigh. . . . (After an interval) Some predal hand doth halt the wandering air; Now dies the throttled wind with rattling breath, And round about a breathing Silence prowls. (After another interval) I hear the cheeping of the bat-lipped ghouls, Aroused beneath the vaulted cypresses Far off; and lipless muttering of tombs, With clash of bones bestirred in ancient charnels Beneath their shroud of unclean light that crawls. . . . Earth shudders, and rank odours 'gin to rise From tombs a-crack: and shaken out all at once From mid-air, and directly 'neath the moon, Meseems what hanging wing divides the light, Like a black film of mist, or thickest shadow: But on the tombs there is no shadow ! First Witch Enough ! 'twill be a prosperous night, methinks, For commerce of the demons with the dead, And for us too, when every omen's good, And fraight with promise of a potent brew.